Travel Blog #164 - The whales, dolphins and turtles on Lanai!

Everyone dreams of experiencing a perfect day out on the water. Smooth seas, warm air, whales spouting off all around you, dolphins coming up to the boat, snorkeling with Sea Turtles...... All with an experienced Captain & Crew taking care of all the serious tasks so you can just kick back and relax. Today we went on a trip like that. It was called the Half Day Lanai Snorkel with Hawaii Ocean Rafting.

My camera assistant for the day (whose name is also Jake) and I checked in for the boat at the Hawaii Ocean Rafting slip in Lahaina Harbor. We arrived just as the sun was beginning to peek out from behind the West Maui Mountains, illuminating the water on the channel. From everything we could see so far, today looked like it was going to have great weather. We filled out the liability waivers and got our boarding passes, then took the last couple minutes while everyone was boarding to ready our camera gear. Both Jake and I had DSLR's and Gopro Hero 3's with some pole mounts that we had made using some aluminum tubing that we attached the cameras to using the factory roll bar mounts. We've been bringing these with us all season in case a pod of whales got close enough to try to get an underwater shot. Today we did not get that lucky but we did get some amazing clips of some dolphins that swam up to our boat.

Within about 20 minutes from when we checked in we were beginning to board the boat and shortly after that we were making our way our of the Lahaina Harbor and onto the channel. The large motors on the 30' Hard Bottom Inflatable powered it with ease through the smooth waters of the channel. The inflatable surround seemed to act like a shock absorber and smoothed out the bumps as we got up to high speeds. Within minutes we had crossed the channel and encountered our first of many pods of Humpback Whales that we saw during the day. The competition pods were the most active. The biggest one we saw had at least eight whales in it, all of which were floating about on the surface slapping their tails, pectoral fins and even their heads onto each other as they competed for mating rights. It was quite a sight to see.

Once we made it to Lanai we jumped off to snorkel at two different locations. The spots our captain choose today were "Armchairs" & "Sweetheart Rock". Both of these locations had an abundance of fish. While I was diving I also encountered a large Green Sea Turtle that seemed to be curious of the mirrored reflective lenses on my mask because it seemed like he would turn towards me every time I looked directly at him (which made for some great pictures). Also, at the second snorkel location when I was getting in the water the Captain told me about some underwater caves that I could swim through. I followed her direction and I found a hole with a small opening on the other side that I swam through. I remember thinking that it seemed pretty tight, but with my free diving fins that have 33" long blades it is easy to feel confined in even large enclosed areas. I continued to snorkel around the pinnacle of coral when the Captain (whose name was Lydia) swam up to me and asked if I had found the cave. I described the one that I swam through and she looked at me with a confused expression and said "You went through that hole? The cave I was talking about is over here!" She motioned for me to follow her as she swam over to a much opening in the rock that was actually a legitimate cave. We took a couple of breaths to get ready and then dove down to make the swim through in one side of the cave and out the other. As we popped out the other side Lydia told me that it was time for lunch so we began to swim back towards the boat. Once we got there they served up some platters of fruit and as well as vegetables and dip that were more then enough to tide us over until we made it back to Lahaina.

My Overall Impression: From the way the weather looked as we initially got to the harbor my expectations for this trip were pretty high. However, once the trip started the Captain and Crew definitely met, if not outright exceeded my expectations for the day. I though they did a great job making sure everyone was having fun and feeling well taken care of. Of course the help of the whales, dolphins and turtles really did a good job of making them look good too....but their attentiveness to the passengers throughout the day really was first class. I would recommend this trip for a group that wants to go to Lanai that can handle the bumpy riding nature of a raft, but does not want to commit to an entire day of being out on the water.

Travel Blog - Articles #160 to #169

When most people get off the plane on Oahu I don't think they have any idea that you can have the sort of experiences that we had today. Today we took a trip with Hawaii Nautical that took us snorkeling on the Western coastline of the island.

We decided to go for a hiking adventure with Hike Maui through the Wailele Permaculture farm and the surrounding park areas and waterfalls. We met our guide in Kahului at the "Park & Ride" parking lot.

Of all of the different fishing trips that we offer I think it is fair to say that as a general rule of thumb, the bottom fishing charters that we have generally catch a larger volume of fish then our deep sea sport fishing charters.

Paragon Sailing Charters operates a type of catamaran that is not utilized by anyone else in the Hawaiian Islands. The designer of the catamarans that are used by Paragon Sailing Charters is the owner of the company, Eric Barto.

One of the most popular categories of tours that we carry on Maui are the Haleakala Bike trips. There are many companies that we carry that offer this trip, but what many people do not realize is there is quite a bit of difference between the different varieties of downhill biking trips.

Related Information

We've compiled all of our blog articles and FAQ's relating to Dolphin Excursions into one place. Unlike Whales the Dolphins do not migrate here and live here year round so "dolphin season" is all 12 months out of the year.

Snorkeling is the most popular vacation activity in Hawaii. We offer snorkel trips from sailboats, large powerboats and even small zodiac rafts. We've got blog articles about our trips aboard all types of boats on all the major islands and if you're thinking about doing a snorkeling excursion during your stay we encourage you to check out our blog articles and videos to get a better idea of what our trips are like.

Related Activites

Snorkel at three different snorkel sites. Includes snorkeling instruction and equipment, a light breakfast, juice and soda. Also available are optical masks, boogie boards, waist belts and underwater cameras.